On Convenience, Conversion, and Convulsion. Some have taken note of the black lack in the creation of civilization, complex societies, and high culture. Yet, in a certain sense, blacks could take pride in not having been able to create Wakandas, because for every gain, there is a loss. And for every loss, there is a... Read More

The Biden administration intensified its war on China last week when it detonated a thermonuclear bomb at the heart of Beijing's booming technology industry. In an effort to block China's access to crucial semiconductor technology, Team Biden announced onerous new export rules aimed at a "comprehensive supply cut-off" of essential semic

Americans boast incessantly about their competitiveness and the miracles of their predatory capitalist system, but on examination these claims appear to be mostly thoughtless jingoism that transmutes historical accidents into religion. If we examine the record, US companies have seldom been notably competitive. There is more than abundant evidence that their efforts are mostly directed... Read More

Introduction China has the world’s longest high-speed rail (HSR) network with some 38,000 kilometers in operation, [1] which comprises nearly 70% of all the world’s high-speed lines [2] and more than three times that of the entire European Union. [3] China has more than 2,500 high-speed trains in operation, more than all the rest of... Read More

At the risk of appearing to be a shill, I think it is safe to say that China arguably has the best mobile phone service in the world, certainly second to none, while the US and Canada have arguably the worst, surely the most fragmented and dysfunctional, and certainly the most expensive. Let's look at... Read More

Technological advance in China is rapid, broad in scope and, one might suppose (apparently) incorrectly, of interest to Americans. It is also easily discovered. Subscriptions are not all that expensive to Asia Times, NikkeiAsia, the South China Morning Post, and Aviation Week. The web is awash in tech sites covering everything from operating systems for... Read More

Today’s characteristically luminous insights will be disordered and structurally horrifying, the sort of essay that would have sent my high-school English teacher into anaphylactic shock. In exculpation I plead laziness. Recently I wrote a column on China’s digital yuan, now in late-stage testing. Bare-bones explanation: You download a digital-wallet app with which you can then... Read More

Since this is Black History month (how can we forget?), it is important (since there is no White History month) to pay tribute to the humble contributions that White folks have made to our culture and to Western Civilization. I don’t want to risk bragging by enumerating the obvious and blaring it out like some... Read More

In a sort of distributed Ouija board enterprise, intellectuals these days predict the likely evolution of relations between China and America. These authorities do not wallow in consistency. China will take over the world. Alternatively, China will collapse because of a surfeit of men, because the different linguistic regions will become independent, because their debt... Read More

For many years the United States has regarded itself as, and been, the world’s technological leader. One can easily make a long and impressive list of seminal discoveries and inventions coming from America, from the moon landings to the internet. It was an astonishing performance. The US maintains a lead, though usually a shrinking one,... Read More

Probably the single most important political fact about the modern world has been the steady rise of the United States of America. From a geopolitical point of view, the United States really is in a class of its own. While the Soviet Union might have rivaled the U.S. militarily, and while China and the European... Read More

As a child I learnt the old rhyme characterizing the months: So there went Showery, and now we're into Flowery. The back yard is a riot of daffodils (or a host, if you want to be punctilious about it). Then comes Bowery; which, taking the word to mean "leafy" means up to the treehouse for... Read More

Being as I am a curmudgeon, and delight in human folly and thoughts of huge asteroids, tsunamis, incurable plagues, continent-shattering volcanoes, and the Hillary administration, I follow the advance of robots with hope. They may finally end civilization as we know it. Currently they spread like kudzu. Herewith a few notes from my favorite technical... Read More

Today we will reflect that the economy will shortly wither, no one will have to work, and we will all die of starvation sitting on street corners and trying to sell each other pencils. Work is going the way of the dodo, the Constitution, and common sense. Won’t be any. Doom moves in ripples. Suppose... Read More